(The last request above was a DNS lookup known as an SRV record, a common way of looking up server names for specific services, including autodiscover, in Microsoft domains. Indeed, when we tried setting up Outlook 2016 on a network with no autodiscover files or servers present, and where we therefore expected Outlook to go through its entire repertoire of possible autodiscover file locations, we observed it looking for the following sequence of network names within our own domain: Microsoft’s autodiscover process can include numerous different steps, as explained in its own Autodiscover documentation, and different apps may use slightly different variants on the Microsoft’s central theme.įor email accounts, Autodiscover typically involves creating a short list of URLs where configuration file data can be expected, and then trying to access those URLs and fetch the setup data that’s stored there, until one of them succeeds (or all of them fail).įor an email address such as as shown above, the documentation suggests that you’d look for the following configuration files: If you’ve ever gone through the process, you’ve probably seen the two simple setup screens above, where you put in your email address, tell it you’re looking for an Exchange server, and Outlook goes out and autodiscovers the configuration details for you.
OUTLOOK 2016 FOR MAC UNEXPECTED DATA PASSWORD
The problem, according to the researchers, is down to a Microsoft feature known as Autodiscover, which is used by various parts of Windows, notably Outlook, to simplify the setup of new accounts.įor example, if I want to hook up Outlook on my laptop to “the Exchange server” that’s run by IT, I don’t need to know and type in a whole pile of technical specifications correctly before I get as far as setting up a password and sending my first email.
OUTLOOK 2016 FOR MAC UNEXPECTED DATA WINDOWS
…in which they claim to have collected hundreds of thousands of Exchange and Windows passwords that were inadvertently uploaded to their servers by unsuspecting Outlook users from a wide range of company networks. Researchers at a cybersecurity startup called Guardicore just published a report about an experiment they conducted over the past four months… Thanks to James Cope and Rajeev Kapur of Sophos IT for their help with this article.
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